Introduction!

Alright everyone!! I am soo excited to start this blog! I have wanted to start one for quite some time but due to my perfectionist personality, which I constantly attempt to keep at bay like a fire that strives to rage despite firefighters efforts to squelch it, I have hesitated in starting it feeling like it was essential that my first post is so FANTASTIC that it blows everyone out of the water. Basically I decided I'd better just start it and eventually one of my blog posts will be meaningful and help some person with whatever they struggle with :). I love life! I love sharing the gospel of Jesus Christ.

Thursday, February 9, 2012

I want to share with each and every one of you something which I think is of UTMOST IMPORTANCE.

When I discovered this little aspect of society and the media I had already been in recovery from my eating disorder for about two years. I thought I pretty much had eating disorders figured out, what caused mine, what triggers them, how they develop, why they are so effective at smothering happiness and peace, EVERYTHING but then one day my friend was doing a video project for one of her classes about the effects of the media. They did a section of it about the effects of the media on eating disorders. She asked me if I would like to be a part of her project and be interviewed by her because she knew that I had been in recovery from an eating disorder. I said yes of course because I LOVE raising awareness about eating disorders but at that time I was very fuzzy on my opinion of the extent to which the media gives influence to the development of an eating disorder. Since then I have been blown away by what I have noticed, experienced and learned on this topic. It blows my mind that these ideas and practices and consistencies had never been in my conscience awareness. It appalls me that all of this which I am about to speak of has become so commonplace and that it is so prevalent and sneaky that I NEVER noticed it until it was thrown in my face by someone who had somehow conceived of the idea. This had obviously been effecting me my whole life, this I am confident of, but I had never noticed it. Even through vigorous recovery from the thoughts and mentalities that make up and eating disorder and are CLEARLY promoted by these tactics (of which I will soon explain I promise) I never never suspected them as a source of negative influence. Here is the clip of portions of the interview my friend conducted and it contains realizations I made during the documentary.

LINK COMING SOON!! ( I can't find it at the moment... :)

One of the first things I did in terms of realizing this negative influence of the media was watch this documentary which I hesitate to add a link to because parts of the documentary are to me erotic and sexual BECAUSE what it is showing is the overwhelmingly constant sexualization and objectification among other negative -izations and -ifications of women in advertising. So basically I hesitate but it made a huge difference on how I understood the effects of the media and how a false role of women is so harmfully defined and perpetuated by advertising. It was very helpful for me and so I wouldn't necessarily recommend it to men but for some of you women, it was VERY helpful for me and so it may be for you as well!

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-1993368502337678412

For those of you who watched the documentary and my clip.... WOW. Now I would ask you to notice every advertisement you see. Look at every cover of every magazine in a new light and notice every model and movie star. Notice how women are objectified and always sexualized and often shown as the submissive weaker sex. Notice how nearly every lead role in nearly every movie/show you watch has the same super skinny body type which is far from a reality let alone a healthy reality for most of us. NOTE THIS: PAY ATTENTION TO THIS: I am not criticizing that body type. It too is beautiful and there are those who are naturally of that particular body type. It is beautiful but too many women ruin their happiness and peace and basically their sanity through body image obsession, dieting, eating disorders to attain what is consistantly painted as the ONLY option for beauty and validity a woman. Notice how many teenage/younger celebrities as they become more famous frequently become skinnier and skinnier as they fold to the pressures of attaining the "ideal" body type. Notice how ladies of other races with darker skin pigment are lightened on the covers of magazines. Notice how all the celebrities on the covers of magazines have no an eyebrow hair out of place, not a single wrinkle and wow they look almost perfect. Like does Jennifer Aniston never age??? Well I honestly thought she didn't and that she still had such a flawlessly young face even at age 42. But these images are so altered! The following are two links which helped me to realize what the media does to women and our view of what is beautiful.

I realized that every time I see a female lead character in a movie and she is SUPER skinny and she falls in love and is good enough to have the adoration of a man, I equate her lovableness with her physical form. Every time I see ANY model on a billboard or store window and she is the super-skinny body type and often in a sexualized pose I fight the temptation to long for that idealized body size and must fight to not be persuaded that the worth and role of women is singularly contained in their sexuality. You lose 100% of the battles you don't know you are fighting. We are in a war for our peace and happiness. We will win.

PLEASE PLEASE share these links, share my blog post and PLEASE share these ideas with EVERY. WOMAN. YOU. LOVE. and come in contact with. This issue brings to light that which has the ability to undermine our role and potential as women and drastically influences our lives in an oh so negative way! Love you all! Keep up the FIGHT! :)